The terms Hindu and
Hinduism are said
to be a more recent development, while the more accurate term is
Sanatana Dharma.

The term Hindu is said to have referred to
the culture of the people
on the other side of the Sindhu River. Although the terms Hindu and Hinduism were
created by foreign invaders, sometimes using them as derogatory terms,
the indigenous people then co-opted these terms (mostly in the past 200
years) as collective or umbrella
terms
to describe themselves and their various ways of living, and many
different religions and spiritual practices, a custom which continues
today.
The original term, predating these by thousands
of years, was Sanatana Dharma, a profound term that is rich with
beauty and inherent wisdom. Out of that Sanatana Dharma emerged
modern Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism, while significantly
effecting many other religions or traditions, which also followed much
later. The underlying reality referred to by the term Sanatana Dharma
is actually eternal, and thus is beyond any reference to the first usage
of the term, or to any religions or traditions stemming from it.

Sanatana
denotes that which always is,
that which has neither beginning nor end,
that which is eternal in its very essence.

Dharma is designed
to communicate the view that
there is an underlying structure of natural law
that is inherent in the very intrinsic constitution
of Being itself - an essential nature.

Thus,
Sanatana Dharma refers to the eternal,
natural way, the never beginning and never
ending flow of the whole of being.

The following quotes
are from Dr. Frank Morales in an
article entitled Word As
Weapon: The Misuse of Terminology in the Study of Hinduism (original
article):

...Used often as a matter of
convenience even by followers of the religion itself (including by this
author), the term "Hindu" is not a term that is inherent to
the religion itself. Rather, the term is known to have been first coined
by the ancient Persians, who were culturally, religiously, and
perspectivally extrinsic to the culture. The term was first used by
these ancient Persians in order to conveniently designate the ancient
Vedic spiritual culture, and was mistakenly used to refer to the Vedic
religion as primarily a geographic and ethnic phenomenon, more than as a
religio-philosophical world-view. To the ancient Persians, the word
“Hindu” simply referred to the culture, people, religion and
practices of the peoples who lived on the other side of the Sindhu
River. In the ancient Avestan Persian language 's' grammatically became
'h'. Thus, the Persians pronounced the name of this river “Hindhu”,
rather than “Sindhu”. Thus, ironically, the currently used word
“Hindu” is itself a corruption of the Persian word “Hindhu”,
which is in turn a corruption of the term “Sindhu”, which is itself
only referring to a river, and not a religion! Thus when the word
“Hindu” is used today to refer to the ancient religion of India, the
term is in actuality a corruption of a corruption of a word whose
meaning is irrelevant to begin with.

The terms "Hindu/Hinduism"
are not self-referential terms that the practitioners of the Vedic
world-view chose for themselves or called themselves. These words are
not attested to in any of the ancient Vedic or Classical Sanskrit
literatures, or even in any of the many local dialects of ancient India
until the medieval era. One will not find the term “Hindu” used to
describe the Vedic religion in the Vedas, the Upanishads,
the Puranas, the Mahabharata, the Ramayana, or
anywhere else in the Vedic scriptures. The word “Hindu” is not
intrinsic to the religion of the Vedas at all. It was not, in
fact, until as late as the 19th century, under the colonial rule of the
British Raj, that these dual terms even acquired any legal significance
on a national scale in India.

The actual term that the Vedic
tradition uses to refer to itself is “Dharma”. The word Dharma is
found repeatedly throughout the entire corpus of the Vedic scriptures,
from the Rg Veda to the Bhagavad Gita. There is almost no
scripture in the entirety of Hinduism where one will not come across the
word Dharma as the preeminent name of the religion in question.
Sometimes the word Dharma is used by itself; at other times it is used
in conjunction with other qualifying words, such as “Vaidika Dharma”
(Vedic Dharma), “Vishva Dharma” (Global Dharma), or "Sanatana
Dharma" (the Eternal Dharma). The diversity of adjectival emphasis
will vary in accordance with the precise context in which the word is
used. Of these terms, the name “Sanatana Dharma” has been the most
widely used name of this ancient religion, and is used as far back as
the Rg Veda, the very earliest scripture of Hinduism, and the
earliest written text known to humanity. It is also the most
philosophically profound and conceptually beautiful name for our
religion.

While many reading this work have no
doubt encountered the term “Sanatana Dharma” before, not every
follower of Sanatana Dharma is necessarily as familiar with the full
philosophical implications of the term's meaning. Thus it is necessary
to explicate the term's full meaning in depth. The Sanskrit word "sanatana"
is the easier of the words to translate into non-Sanskrit languages. It
denotes that which always is, that which has neither beginning nor end,
that which is eternal in its very essence. The concept of eternality
that the word “sanatana” is trying to convey is a radically
different concept than is ordinarily understood in the Western Abrahamic
religions. When the religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam employ
the concept of eternality, it usually means that x thing, having
come into being, will never come to an end. In other words,
“eternal” for the Abrahamic religions, usually refers only to the
future. A more accurate term for this Abrahamic concept is thus
“everlasting”, rather than “eternal” proper.

In Sanatana Dharma, however, the
concept of eternality denotes something quite different from the
standard Western notion. In this more expansive and bi-directional
model, the concept of sanatana extends not only into the infinite
recesses of the future, but into the past as well. By referring to
something as “sanatana”, the idea is that not only will it
never come to an end, but it has always had necessary existence. Thus,
God (Brahman), the individual self (atman), prime materiality (jagat
or prakriti), Truth (satya), the Veda (Truth
rendered into literary form), and Dharma itself all have necessary
existence. They always have been - and they shall always be....

Unlike the word “sanatana”,
the term ''dharma" is a term that can be properly rendered
into the English language only with the greatest of difficulty. This is
the case because there is no one corresponding English term that fully
renders both the denotative and the connotative meanings of the term
with maximal sufficiency. Rather than merely communicating a nominal
subject for which there can be an easy word for word equivalency, dharma
is communicating a metaphysical concept. The denotative meaning of
"dharma" straightforwardly designates an essential
attribute of x object - an attribute whose absence renders the
object devoid of either rational meaning or existential significance. A
thing's dharma is what constitutes the thing's very essence,
without which, the very concept of the thing would be rendered
meaningless. To illustrate the full meaning of this term, we can use the
following examples: It is the dharma of water to be wet. Without
the essential attribute (dharma) of wetness, the concept and
existential fact of water loses all meaning. Likewise, it is the dharma
of fire to be hot, the dharma of space to be expansive, etc. The
denotative meaning of dharma is easy enough to comprehend. It is,
however, when we come to the connotative meaning of the term "dharma"
that we then leave the more microcosmic concerns of Vaisesika
categoriology behind, and then enter the realm of the overtly
philosophical.

For, according to the Vedic tradition
itself, the very empirical cosmos in which we find ourselves currently
situated also has its own inherent dharma, its essential
attributive nature, without which the universe becomes meaningless. In
this more macro-cosmological sense, the term dharma is designed
to communicate the view that there is an underlying structure of natural
law that is inherent in the very intrinsic constitution of Being itself.
The Vedic world-view sees the universe as a place that has inherent
meaning, purpose and an intelligent design underlying its physical
principles and laws. The world is here for a purpose – God's purpose.
The word Dharma, in this more important philosophical sense, refers to
those underlying natural principles that are inherent in the very
structure of reality, and that have their origin in God. Dharma is
Natural Law. Thus, if we needed to render the entire term “Sanatana
Dharma” into English, we can cautiously translate it as "The
Eternal Natural Way". Sanatana Dharma is the true name of our
religion.

The term “Sanatana Dharma” more
accurately communicates the axiomatic metaphysical nature of this
concept than do the less meaningful and concocted terms
“Hindu/Hinduism”. Thus, when the terms "Hindu/Hinduism"
are repeatedly used by both Euro-American and Indian scholars, as well
as by actual followers of this eternal spiritual tradition, we fall very
far short from fully communicating the metaphysical, ethical and
ontological components of the world-view of Sanatana Dharma. The former
term – i.e., “Hinduism” - is a word mistakenly created to describe
a culture in a purely ethnic, national and social context. The latter
– “Sanatana Dharma” - is describing an illustrious science of
Being in a purely philosophical - and therefore highly rational, and
inherently beautiful - sense. It is understandable that the terms
“Hindu/Hinduism” will continue to be used periodically as a matter
of convenience. After all, it takes time, coupled with continuous
education, for people to break themselves of a two hundred year old
habit. For the sake of accuracy, as well as to uphold the dignity,
beauty and grandeur of our ancient and sacred religion, however, we must
always do our utmost to use the much more meaningful, linguistically
correct and beautiful name Sanatana Dharma when referring to our
religion. Our religion is Sanatana Dharma....

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